There is one thing about this movie that cannot be missed. I can see that it worked really well on the small details.

Very romantic and heartwarming

Great drama. I wish every girl may find their true love

A movie that starts off slow, but slowly picks up and then it falls flat with a rushed ending.

Talk about a birthday girl celebrating the wrong way Nicole Kidman and Ben Chaplin A single man John impulsively orders a bride online Nadia She seems graceful, elegant, and refined It also happens to be her birthday when they meet But when her family arrives she starts spilling secrets about her life that John isn't ready for Nadia's past makes things shaky for John so can he fully trust her or abandon the relationship altogether? Bad stuff John is dragged into involved guns money etc The movie feels a bit run of the mill plus the shift in tone makes it feel very uneven It's very messy story wise But Kidman has some decent range here and Chaplin plays a good lovesick guy

The tone is all over the place. Not romantic and not at all thrilling.

I'll go out on a limb and write "this is Nicole Kidman like you've never seen her before." And I think you'll like it. The movie is a lightweight, but Kidman, Ben Chapin and a couple of Russian thugs made this a passable flick. Dubbed a comedy/crime/thriller, it fails in all three areas. But combined with a good cast, they barely get away with it.

Wow. To think Nicole Kidman, a future Oscar winner, would be in a film this bad is frankly downright depressing. The main blame falls on the director, who had no sense of drama, pace or structure. But the "leading man" was made of wood, and the script lacked imagination, flair or passion. The one redeeming value, and the only thing that kept me watching, was Kidman's sublime beauty and the sex scenes she was in. I was impressed with her command of Russian though. Avoid this one even if it's on cable.

Not bad. Kept me interested the whole way through.

This is really Ben Chaplin's movie. He comes across as such a charming dork, and his character and Nicole Kidman mach such a cute couple. Cute story.

i didn't really care much about this movie

listed as com-dram I didn't find anything funny in this drama.

Not too bad...fun, quirky, dark comedy thriller. Both Kidman and Chaplin give good, convincing performances here...Kidman's Russian role as the more challenging. Not a masterpiece, but certainly enjoyable.

Mail ordering a bride from Russia is one of the worst ideas in the history of mankind, but yet again, I've never been lonely enough to turn towards desperation. Yet John (Ben Chaplin) is a man you can somehow sympathize with. He works a harshly boring job as a banker, lives in the middle of nowhere, doesn't have a social life, and has a micro-sized amount of self-confidence. As he surfs dating website "From Russia with Love", it's hard to judge him. Well, judge him completely. Surely, most with common sense wouldn't look online to marry a woman they've never met, but what does John have to lose? He settles on Nadia (Nicole Kidman), whose looks cloud his judgement - upon her arrival, it's discovered that she doesn't speak a word of English. But John learns to love her (learn, or trade disappointment for settlement?), and it's an accomplishment, considering they can't even carry on a conversation. On her birthday, Nadia and John are greeted by a pair of men (Vincent Cassel and Mathieu Kassovitz) who claim to be Nadia's cousins, but after it turns out that something much shadier is on the horizon, John is forced to question whether or not he is willing to look past Nadia's faults and continue their romance. Movies contain many life lessons, and a well-known one is that it isn't a great idea to marry a person you've never met. In François Truffaut's "Mississippi Mermaid", Jean-Paul Belmondo exchanged rings with Catherine Deneuve, and, despite her ethereal beauty, she turned out to be mysterious in extremely dangerous ways, to say the least. The difference between "Mississippi Mermaid" and "Birthday Girl" is that the former had much more to do with plot, and Belmondo and Deneuve's chemistry was poker hot. "Birthday Girl" is thoroughly unconvincing when it comes to the relationship between John and Nadia. It's a film that can't decide if it wants to be a romantic comedy or a caper - although calling it uneven wouldn't be completely true - and the writing isn't strong enough to entirely convince us of the situation. In just 30 minutes, we are supposed to believe that John and Nadia have built a strong enough relationship to make the criminal twist more of a shock; later on, we're forced to accept that, despite all the lies and deception, a romance should bloom. Butterworth does all he can to convince us that opposites actually might attract, but the story is much too flimsy to convince us of anything. Although the writing is subpar, the leads are not. Even when there isn't a screenplay to support them entirely, they have enough charisma to evoke something. Kidman's Russian accent is perfectly intact, and Chaplin seems born to forever play the naïve guy in the middle of an awful situation. If "Birthday Girl" hadn't come out when Kidman was all over the map with "The Others", "Moulin Rouge!", and "The Hours", it may have been considered above average. But it sits within a crevasse in a glacier of masterpieces, and it simply isn't good enough to escape.

It's commendable for Kidman's and Ben Chaplin's performances, but besides that there is nothing much else here to like. The tone is wildly uneven and the film can't decide what it wants to be.

I personally really enjoyed this movie though it was really predictable. I still LOL quite a few times and just like the underlining humor throughout.

Besides bad criticism, I think this is a very decent film. Not bad. Depending on your taste of films it's not one for all but it is great for the rest. I like the story line twists and turns.

A thirtysomething bank clerk (Ben Chaplin) from St Albans has his small-town life exploded by the arrival of his Russian mail-order bride (Nicole Kidman). also stars Vincent Cassel, Mathieu Kassovitz, Kate Evans, Rebecca Clarke, Sue Maund, Alan Stocks and Ben Miller. directed by Jez Butterworth.

Ein leichter und unterhaltsamer Film, an einem nassen, grauen Sonntag. Obwohl die Geschichte nichts Neues erzählt, muss man doch ab und zu schmunzeln. Kidman hat noch nie schärfer ausgesehen!

Directed by playwright Jez Butterworth, who had got into cinema with Mojo (1997), here he got lucky and was able to attract a big name or two. It should have broke Butterworth into cinema big time, and he could have gone on to better things. However, it's release was delayed, and the short buzz it had got during filming was all but forgotten by the time it came out. Shame, as it's a clever and very twisty along the way. In St. Albans, bank clerk John Buckingham (Ben Chaplin) is very shy and hopeless with relationships. So, he goes on the internet, and orders a Russian mail-order bride, who arrives in the form of Nadia (Nicole Kidman), who despite the description, cannot speak a word of English. But, she and Ben soon bond, and it seems like this could actually work. But then there's a knock at the door, and Nadia's "cousins" Yuri (Mathieu Kassovitz) and his friend Alexei (Vincent Cassel) arrive to celebrate Nadia's birthday. Ben is bemused by their arrival, and after a few days, asks them to leave, but it's only then he discovers their true intentions. It's a good, gripping drama but it has some moments of hilarious black comedy thoughout, Butterworth gets the best from his cast, and it's a different sort of part for Kidman to play, but it has brilliant support from Alexander Armstrong, Stephen Mangan and The League of Gentlemen!!